It’s budget season in North Carolina. Governments at every level, from the General Assembly to town councils in tiny rural towns, are trying to reconcile needs with cash flow and come up with a spending plan by the beginning of the next fiscal year, July 1.
It’s never easy and sometimes is excruciatingly painful.
It shouldn’t be at all painful for the members of the General Assembly. They’re sitting on a mountain of surplus revenue that is substantially in excess of half a billion dollars. That’s a great gift. And it should be the way to finally get things back on post-recession track, helping lawmakers erase some of the budget cuts that both Democrats and Republicans had to make in the worst economic crash since the Great Depression.
Trouble is, legislative leaders want to give the surplus back to the taxpayers instead of using it to make this state a national leader. By proposing another round of deep tax cuts, they’re proving that their vision ends at the next election, not decades into North Carolina’s future.
During a budget discussion last month, Randolph County Republican Sen. Jerry Tillman was Mr. Optimism about the great things that would happen if the Senate leadership gets its way on tax cuts. “Tax cuts spur more growth,” Tillman said. “They certainly have in the last six years.”
That’s a pretty broad assumption. Yes, taxes have been cut in North Carolina, and that did help drive some growth, since our corporate tax rates were way out of line in comparison with our neighbors’ rates. But then, our economy didn’t grow all that much more or faster than those in other states. Our improvement about matched the national average. Our unemployment rate has consistently run a bit above the national average. Getting our corporate taxes in line with the rest of the Southeast was a good idea, but slashing them further won’t vault us into some version of first place.
Some of our legislative leaders would have us believe that they have created an economic miracle here. They need to take off their rose-colored glasses. A Forbes magazine survey last year ranked our economy as 18th-best in the country. We’re average. Utah ranks No. 1, followed by Washington state and California.
What will put us back where we were is returning to our former status as a great education state. Our public schools were among the very best in the South. Our educators earned the best salaries in the South. We turned out well-educated and well-trained students who became part of a workforce that business and industry coveted. That’s why so many companies moved here. It’s no accident that the dramatic success of businesses in the Research Triangle Park occurred because they were smack in the middle of some of the nation’s best public education, in both K-12 and at the university level. After years of budget cuts, they are at best struggling to maintain that distinction. Some would argue that they’ve long since lost it.
And that’s not beginning to talk about the economic wasteland that dominates much of this state’s rural landscape. Our successes have largely been limited to the Triangle and Charlotte. Corporate tax cuts have done nothing for a place like Robeson County, and many others like it. More cuts won’t help. Better education funding will.
Our elected leaders in Raleigh have a great opportunity this year. They can use their surplus revenue to lift this state’s students to higher achievement. They can create the great workforce of the future, one that will draw employers to this state. Or they can get themselves re-elected with a short-sighted tax cut. We hope they’ll choose to invest the money in our state’s future.
— GateHouse Media
http://www.thetimesnews.com/opinion/20170509/editorial-surplus-money-should-go-education-and-future
